A Streetcar Named Hyundai: the car turning London into work of art

Hyundai and Ordnance Survey team up to map the capital through 650,000 street pictures
Clocking up the miles: the camera is mounted on a Hyundai fuel cell car which emits nothing but water

Virtually every inch of the 2,005-mile network of central London roads that comprises The Knowledge is being immortalised on film and turned into a stunning mosaic in a unique new project.

A camera — controlled by special software mounted on a Hyundai Fuel Cell car emitting nothing but water — is snapping 650,000 high-resolution street pictures to create the work of art. The roof-mounted Fuji X-T1 camera will also create a 200.5-second time-lapse video of the entire journey as it drives central London’s streets, creating a time capsule film of the capital as it appears in 2015.

I had the privilege of being the first person to drive the Hyundai as I joined the team at Charing Cross, clocking up the first handful of miles with the camera whirring silently away in the background.

The project is aimed at marking 10 years since Hyundai Motor UK was founded, and will, in total, take 50 days of intensive driving to complete, capturing images of famous landmarks, shops, offices, people, parks, streets and other well-known London vistas.

Dubbed “A Streetcar Named Hyundai”, the ix35 Fuel Cell model is following a route mapped out by the Ordnance Survey team that also delivered the Olympic torch route.

It is being driven by well-known names — including Jamie Laing from Made in Chelsea and Nicola Adams, Britain’s first female Olympic boxing champion and a gold medal winner at the 2012 games, as well as Hyundai employees.

By yesterday, the car had been driving for 16 days, covering 487 miles and taking just over 105,000 images.

Eventually, it will have covered all 2,005 miles within a six-mile radius of Charing Cross, ending on November 19. It’s the first time the total number of street miles defined by the central London Knowledge has been calculated, and the work was carried out by the Ordnance Survey team. Hyundai’s own technicians created the software capturing the drive. It controls the camera shutter based on the car’s speed, distance travelled and angle of travel. The estimated 650,000 images, each measuring 0.5cm x 0.5cm, will be “woven” into a world-first photo mosaic measuring five metres by two metres.

“We’re incredibly proud of how far Hyundai has come in the UK in the short space of 10 years,” said Tony Whitehorn, Hyundai Motor UK’s president and CEO. “A Streetcar Named Hyundai is another ‘first’ from us that marks our journey from 2005. It’s fantastic that it will be completed in a car that emits nothing but water.”

Nigel Clifford, chief executive of Ordnance Survey (OS), said: “From the outset of the challenge, it was clear that detailed digital mapping and accurate routing would play a vital role. At OS, we map Great Britain to amazing detail, making more than 10,000 changes a day to the mapping database. This up-to-date, detailed mapping allowed us to confidently plan and plot a continuous route weaving through the capital’s road network. We are delighted to be supporting Hyundai in this challenge and look forward to seeing the end results.”

Hyundai Motor claims to be the fastest growing carmaker in the world and the Hyundai ix35 Fuel Cell is the world’s first commercially-available hydrogen-powered vehicle. The time-lapse video, along with the mosaic, will go on show at a high-profile London venue, to be announced.

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